The term “acronym” as the name for a word (such as SONAR) created from the first letter or letters of each word in a series of words (such as SOund Navigation And Ranging) is believed to have first appeared in 1943. Thus, the term “acronym” is widely used to describe any abbreviation formed by using initial letters. Particularly with governmental or other large organizations, acronyms tend to be prevalent. Often, there is no central database that defines the meanings, also known as the “expansion,” of these acronyms. For example, the “expansion” of “SONAR” is “SOund Navigation and Ranging.” Thus, there is a need for a process for determining the expansion of acronyms.
Acronyms are widely used in webpages, books, text and many other types of documents. Examples of text programs include electronic books, text editor programs, a browser, a word processor, or any other program that displays or manages text.